This invention relates to systems and methods for synchronizing enhancing content with specific junctures in a video program. More particularly, the invention relates to systems and methods for synchronizing the enhancing content with the video program by using the closed captioning script of the video program.
Conventional broadcast television is a non-interactive form of home entertainment. Television signals are broadcast one-way over a broadcast network from a television station or cable provider to home television sets. Viewers passively watch the video content played on the television sets, with their only interactivity being channel selection.
With computers, TV-based video games, and other multimedia environments, home users have become accustomed to interacting with the content being displayed. It is common for a computer user to selectively control what, when, and how content is displayed. For example, a computer user perusing a CD-ROM program on the Civil War might select a topic on Robert E. Lee. The computer user can use a mouse or other pointing device to page through various screens portraying the life of the General, read textual descriptions of Lee""s achievements, click on icons to activate audio and video clips of reenacted war scenes. The whole experience is interactive.
The Internet offers an interactive multimedia environment. With the swift expansion and popularity of the Internet, many users are becoming familiar with xe2x80x9csurfingxe2x80x9d the World Wide Web (xe2x80x9cWebxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cWWWxe2x80x9d) to locate information, conduct business transactions, obtain weather forecasts, conduct banking and other financial matters, shop for merchandise, and so forth. The user can locate and download files in essentially any data format (video, audio, graphical, text, etc.) from essentially anywhere in the world.
With such advances in interactive entertainment, there has been some effort to enhance traditional television video programming with supplemental content. One approach is to support a television broadcast with supplemental content made available on the Internet. As an example, MSNBC news, a cable news network jointly established by Microsoft Corporation and NBC, offers a 24-hour cable news program with concurrent postings at its Web site containing information supplementing the cable broadcast.
Many industry pundits believe that in the future the supplemental content will be offered concurrently with the broadcast television program on the same display device. For example, a home viewer watching an episode of Gilligan""s Island on the television set might be able to access target resources on the Internet is which relate to Gilligan""s Island, or other matters, from the same television set. It would be beneficial to present or make available the supplemental content at specific time slots in the episode. When Gilligan ruins the Skipper""s hat, for example, a producer might want to display a hyperlink to a hat retailer for a brief interval while the episode continues to run. The user then has an opportunity to activate the link to call up the hat retailer web site and shop for a new hat.
One primary problem to enhancing traditional broadcast video programs concerns synchronizing presentation of the enhancing content with specific junctures or scenes in the video programs. In many cases, the enhancing content is not linked or associated with the video program in any useful manner. In the Gilligan example, a hyperlink to the hat retailer has no built in association to the video program Gilligan""s Island. To compound the problem, the enhancing content will most likely not be provided from the same source as the video program.
The inventor has conceived of a technique for synchronizing presentation of the enhancing content with specific scenes in the video programs.
This invention concerns a system and method for synchronizing enhancing content with primary content, such as broadcast television programs, using the closed captioning script of the primary content. In this manner, enhancements to the primary content are timely introduced at preselected phrases or raw data strings of the closed captioning script, and hence at desired junctures of the primary content.
According to one aspect of the invention, a producer of enhancing content obtains the closed captioning script for a video program, such as a traditional broadcast television show, or a cable movie, or a program recorded on video cassette. The producer uses a parsing application to parse the closed captioning script to identify one or more key phrases. Preferably, the parser returns a set of unique phrases, with each phrase having the same number of words, or a unique data character string, with each character string having the same length of characters.
The program enhancement producer decides at what points in the video program to introduce enhancing content. As possible examples, the enhancing content might be a hyperlink to a target resource on the Internet, or manipulation of the video window with concurrent introduction of text or graphical data, or launching an application. After the program enhancement producer outlines the placement of the enhancing content within the video program, the producer uses an authoring computer to associate supplemental data (e.g., a URL, a file name, etc.) used to activate the enhancing content with specific key phrases or character strings of the closed captioning script that correspond to the desired points in the program. The authoring computer creates a key phrase data file which contains a listing of the key phrases or character strings and their association to the supplemental data.
The key phrase data file is delivered to viewer computing units (e.g., personal computer, television with set top box, etc.) at users"" homes. For example, the data file can be delivered over the broadcast network used to transport the video program, over the Internet or other network, or through the mail on a storage disk.
When the program is played, a viewer computing unit equipped with the key phrase data file for that program begins to monitor the closed captioning script. The viewer computing unit has a key phrase detector to detect the key phrases or character strings listed in the key phrase data file. In one implementation, the key phrase detector is a parser which examines sequential groupings of words or characters and compares the groupings with the key phrases in the data file to identify the key phrases. Upon detection of a particular key phrase, the key phrase detector accesses the key phrase data file to retrieve the supplemental data associated with the particular key phrase. The viewer computing unit executes an enhancement action according to the supplemental data to synchronize the enhancement action with scenes in the video program.
According to one implementation, the key phrase detector multicasts the enhancement action to a multicast address. A program enhancement listener listens to the multicast address to receive and handle any enhancement action supported by the supplemental data. The listener can be implemented as an ActiveX(trademark) control embedded in a container, such as an HTML page, or as an application. Using multicasting as an interprocess communication tool within the viewer computing unit effectively decouples the key phrase detection activity from the content enhancement activity, allowing the content enhancement producers to concentrate only on what enhancement actions to make in conjunction with the supplemental data.